Plum Butter Cookies Recipe {Pesochnoe Pirozhnoe}

Plum Butter Cookies – Shortbread Cookie with Plum Butter and Buttercream filling is a classic Ukrainian pastry recipe that is very popular among the Slavic community (Pesochnoe Pirozhenoe)

Having lived in the US for 16 years now, there are not many things that I am nostalgic about when it comes to my home country of Ukraine. Since most of my adult memories were made here, there’s not much I remember to begin with, but there are still a few things that I miss.

These cookies, which were called Pisochnye Pirozhnue (translates as – shortbread pastries) are on that short list of things I miss for sure.

Back home they looked a little different because they had just a tiny tiny smidgen of the filling and whenever you ate it you really wished there was more.

The plum butter gives the cookie a little bit of tartness, which is nice because the cookie itself is sweet. The white cream filling is there to soften the cookie and bring it together with the filling.

At first, when you fill the cookie it has a thick layer of frosting in the middle, but in a day at least half of it gets absorbed by the cookie, making it soft while still adding flavor to the overall thing. So, this cookie should be made a day, or even a couple days ahead and not on the day of.

Being able to make the cookies yourself you can put as much or as little filling as you would like, but in my recipe, I use generous amounts since that is how our family likes it.

Enjoy!Step by step pictures below are from a tripled batch of Plum Butter Cookies.

Plum Butter Cookies (Pesochnoe Pirozhnoe)

Yield: two full 12in x18 in tray of cookies, Or 90 small 2 inch cookies or about 50 medium 3 inch cookies

How to make the Plum Butter Cookies –

Preheat oven to 350 F with the rack in the middle. Combine baking soda with vinegar in a cup and stir until the foam subsides.

Cream together 1/2 cup butter with 1 cup Crisco shortening and 1 cup sugar for about 1 minute with a mixer. Add 1/2 cup of sour cream, 2 egg yolks, 1 egg and the baking soda+vinegar mixture and mix until combined. Now add 3 cups sifted flour and mix until it comes together.

Once the flour is mixed in, add one more cup and mix it in by hand. Split the dough into 4 equal pieces and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Shape and Bake the cookies

The dough comes out pretty crumbly, so we will need to use special techniques to keep the cookies from sticking to the rolling pin, or falling apart, or losing shape as you transfer them from the rolling surface to the baking sheet.

To do this, you will need two large pieces of parchment paper. Now put them inside your jelly roll baking sheet and bend the sides. This will mark how far you need to roll out the dough.

Now remove the sheets and place the dough in the middle of the first sheet. Flatten it into a disk.

Top it with one more piece of parchment paper and roll the dough thinly making it the shape of the inside of the baking sheet, trying to stay within the marked lines. The parchment paper keeps the rolling pin from sticking to the dough. Use a cookie cutter to cut out round cookie shapes leaving only about 1/8 of an inch between each cookie. The cookies don’t expand much, so they will be ok. Now carefully remove the dough excess around the cutouts. Transfer the parchment with the cutouts to the baking sheet.

If you would like to have holes in the top cookies, use a smaller round object to cut out the hole in the middle of each cookie. As you bake, make sure you get equal quantities of both the bases and the tops with the holes in the middle.

Bake in the middle rack for about 7 minutes, or until golden in color, watch them closely as they burn very quickly. Remove from the oven, peel cookies off the parchment paper and allow to cool. Use the parchment paper again to roll out the remaining dough and bake the rest of the cookies.

Make the Cream Cheese Buttercream

Whip 2 sticks butter and 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract for about 5 minutes or until very white/pale in color and increased in volume. Now cut the cream cheese into smaller pieces and add them into the whipped butter a couple cubes at a time, minimally whipping after each addition. Separately whip the heavy cream, then carefully fold it into whipped butter and cream cheese mixture. Do not overfold, as the mixture separates easily. If the mixture does start to separate, take a couple spoons of buttercream and microwave it in 5 seconds increments, about 2 or 3 times, then fold it back into the rest of the buttercream.

Do so, until the cream comes together. With heating the buttercream, you’re just trying to bring it to room temperature, and not make it melt.

Now fill two pastry bags with a 1/4 inch round tip each. Fill one bag with cream cheese buttercream and the other one with plum butter. Plum butter is easier to push through the pastry bag if it is first warmed up.

You can also use just a plain butter knife and a spoon to spread cream cheese buttercream and plum butter on each half of the cookie, but it does take longer than using a pastry bag. Now push two halves with two different fillings together.

Make the glaze and apply to cookies:

Now stir the lemon juice and powdered sugar together until smooth. Take away couple tablespoons of the glaze and add 2 teaspoons of cocoa powder to it, then stir again until smooth; cover with plastic wrap. Either use a teaspoon to spread a little bit of glaze on top of the cookie or dip the top slightly into the glaze then scrape excess against the edge of the bowl.

Now fill a ziplock bag with the cocoa glaze and put a couple lines across lined up cookies in one direction, and then a couple lines in the opposite direction. Allow the tops to harden.

Then, transfer cookies to an airtight container and refrigerate for at least 24 hours before consuming.

Cookies can be frozen in an airtight container for up to 2 months. To thaw, transfer to fridge and leave there until no longer frozen.

Cream Cheese Buttercream Ingredients

Sugar Glaze

Also:

2cupsPlum Butter

Instructions

How to make the Plum Butter Cookies -

Preheat oven to 350 F with the rack in the middle.

Combine baking soda with vinegar in a cup and stir until the foam subsides.

Cream together 1/2 cup butter with 1 cup Crisco shortening and 1 cup sugar for about 1 minute with a mixer. Add 1/2 cup of sour cream, 2 egg yolks, 1 egg and the baking soda+vinegar mixture and mix until combined. Now add 3 cups sifted flour and mix until it comes together. Once the flour is mixed in, add one more cup and mix it in by hand. Split the dough into 4 equal pieces and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before rolling.

Shape and Bake the cookies

The dough comes out pretty crumbly, so we will need to use special techniques to keep the cookies from sticking to the rolling pin, or falling apart, or losing shape as you transfer them from the rolling surface to the baking sheet.

To do this, you will need two large pieces of parchment paper. Now put them inside your jelly roll baking sheet and bend the sides. This will mark how far you need to roll out the dough.

Now remove the sheets and place the dough in the middle of the first sheet. Flatten it into a disk. Top it with one more piece of parchment paper and roll the dough thinly making it the shape of the inside of the baking sheet, trying to stay within the marked lines. The parchment paper keeps the rolling pin from sticking to the dough.

Use a cookie cutter to cut out round cookie shapes leaving only about 1/8 of an inch between each cookie. The cookies don't expand much, so they will be ok. Now carefully remove the dough excess around the cutouts. Transfer the parchment with the cutouts to the baking sheet.

If you would like to have holes in the top cookies, use a smaller round object to cutout the hole in the middle of each cookie. As you bake, make sure you get equal quantities of both the bases and the tops with the holes in the middle.

Bake in the middle rack for about 7 minutes, or until golden in color, watch them closely as they burn very quickly. Remove from the oven, peel cookies off the parchment paper and allow to cool. Use the parchment paper again to roll out the remaining dough and bake the rest of the cookies.

Make the Cream cheese Buttercream

Whip 2 sticks butter and 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract for about 5 minutes or until very white/pale in color and increased in volume.

Now cut the cream cheese into smaller pieces and add them into the whipped butter a couple cubes at a time, minimally whipping after each addition.

Separately whip the heavy cream, then carefully fold it into whipped butter and cream cheese mixture. Do not overfold, as the mixture separates easily. If the mixture does start to separate, take a couple spoons of buttercream and microwave it in 5 seconds increments, about 2 or 3 times, then fold it back into the rest of the buttercream. Do so, until the cream comes together. With heating the buttercream, you're just trying to bring it to room temperature, and not make it melt.

Now fill two pastry bags with a 1/4 inch round tip each. Fill one bag with cream cheese buttercream and the other one with plum butter. Plum butter is easier to push through the pastry bag if it is first warmed up.

You can also use just a plain butter knife and a spoon to spread cream cheese buttercream and plum butter on each half of the cookie, but it does take longer than using a pastry bag. Now push two halves with two different fillings together.

Make the glaze and apply to cookies:

Now stir the lemon juice and powdered sugar together until smooth. Take away couple tablespoons of the glaze and add 2 teaspoons of cocoa powder to it, then stir again until smooth; cover with plastic wrap.

Either use a teaspoon to spread a little bit of glaze on top of the cookie, or dip the top slightly into the glaze then scrape excess against the edge of the bowl.

Now fill a ziplock bag with the cocoa glaze and put a couple lines across lined up cookies in one direction, and then a couple lines in the opposite direction.

Allow the tops to harden.

Then, transfer cookies to an airtight container and refrigerate for at least 24 hours before consuming.

Recipe Notes

Cookies can be frozen in an airtight container for up to 2 months. To thaw, transfer to fridge and leave there until no longer frozen.

Jam or preserve is a lot thinner than plum butter. If you’re to use jam or plum butter, I would put the butter frosting on the bottom half in a ring shape, then put the top portion of the cookie (with the hole) and then fill the hole with jam from the top. Let the settle like that for at least 1 day before trying to eat them, otherwise the jam will ooze out.

Marinochka, Wow, you are so incredibly talented!!! These Cookies look like they came from a store! They do look super delicious! I just have a quick question, if I substitute shortening with butter, will I have similar results? Thank you!